Transformative power of effective and efficient judgement

Love and compassion or purpose is a common thread connecting all of us. In purpose driven life i.e. making it useful for all – first and foremost thing is to pay attention to what life has taught us through challenges, failures, and mistakes and it is really surprising to find that our conclusions do have a great resemblance to core teachings of great masters and sublime scriptures. Many of them were devoid of external education but used their life’s experiences to hunt the wisdom treasure. Because elimination of unnecessary creates space and save energy we need to realize our dreams. Let me list three distilled learning areas:

Energy leakage – unnecessary tasks and projects, long and useless conversations centered around others, on-going and compulsive thinking – mostly negative. Energy depletion creates know-do gap i.e. we find ourselves weak when it comes to implementation of what we know and value. Overwhelm, tiredness, stress, and irritation are its common symptoms.

UN-Examined assumptions– there may be many obsolete beliefs sitting secretly in our core and we go on operating in and through such assumptions unconsciously without ever questioning and verifying % of truth contained in these. This limits our ability to conceive the heights of success and creates mental blocks. Henry Ford expressed this truth very well –

” Whether you think you can or you can’t, you’re right “.

In this post let’s reflect deeply on one aspect of wisdom leakage and UN-Examined assumptions – judgment misuse – and also it’s negative effects, secrets of transformation by non-judgmental awareness and appropriate use. It is easy to unlearn any tendency or belief, once we find it useless and negative from all angles, hence it’s more important to understand clearly first judgment misuse and it’s negative effects.

How we misuse our judgment?

By holding rigid and negative judgment for self, others and situations, missing understanding and sensitivity in the whole process of analysis and judgment. Few common scenarios of misuse…

We can never know anyone fully, but by just hearing anything or reading in media any negative news we believe it to be true. Surprisingly we don’t believe in the positive news that quickly and go on doubting at times compassionate intentions of people who come forward to devote their time to service of others. This unconscious and blind faith in negativity about others are been nourished by judgmental attitude – which finds it difficult to digest that everyone is essentially innocent at the center.

In fact, even if we see someone doing something wrong, since we don’t know background, drivers, context so it’s still inappropriate to jump to any conclusion, but normally we do judge them without any hitch.

We judge others through our mental models, ideals and try to change them to suit our make. This is an obviously useless project and creates unnecessary dependency on others to change for us.

We see ourselves from others viewpoints and past conditioning ( society, UN-Examined assumptions imprints in mind) and struggle all life to fit into their eyes – again an impossible target and useless project. Have suffered a lot due to this, and still slip into it at times.

We judge ourselves for any mistakes done in past and may harbor guilt and repentance for long, and all this leads to psychologically unwell conditions.

We do not spare even situations, which are arrangements by Nature suitable for one’s growth, and keep complaining rather than accepting it fully or taking some efforts to change for better. Another reason is that we fail to see opportunities in challenging situations and miss on the panorama view of connected events.

Negative effects of judgment misuse

The list is big, real and experiential – few key ones to grab our priority attention

Effect of Action is less than Thought which is further less than that of Belief– This conclusion is given by masters and psychologists, which simply means – doing bad is of lesser harm than desiring bad for someone, and which is further lesser than judging or holding a negative belief. As through belief, spiritual energy is utilized in creating reality what we believe about others. We can use this principle either way – to strengthen or weaken self and others.

It’s injustice – We have no right to judge anybody, as we can not know anybody’s situation fully, and so judging them with partial knowledge is kind of injustice with them.

Triggers negative reactions – Persons when judged, normally reacts with finger pointing, anger, resentment and also miss the natural process of self-observation and cleansing. Our attention gets misdirected in putting each other down instead of zeroing down on problems and finding suitable solutions. Pile of such habits and impressions from past create a burden on our psyche making our progress look impossible and tie us down to negative beliefs and hopelessness.

Nourishes false arrogance of feeling better than others– This is obvious, by looking at other faults we forgive ourselves for our own weaknesses and comparatively consider better than others, and this tendency satisfies our ego which brings temporary satiation in learning and growth; we stop learning and become hollow and weak from inside.

Serious risks involved in judging others – Let’s assume we are in power and position to control certain groups – we call normally area of influence, then there are two serious risks like;

case 1 – if we give punishment more than required than it fills the other continue doing same out of anger and frustration.

case 2 – if we give lesser punishment then he/ she is likely to continue out of greed of delta benefit between punishment and projected benefit.

We can clearly see that nature has given this ability primarily for self and not for others and we must be all committed to stopping its misuse.

Transformative secrets of Non-judgement

Now few encouraging facts about staying in non-judgment mode and using it appropriately for self

It operates at a deeper level – We do exist in the continuum, as we experience “I-AM-NESS” all the time, but have a die-hard habit of identifying with thoughts and feelings that appear and disappear in our minds. We hold certain opinions and judgment to be true and tie permanently to our core – so is the power of belief. And this unconscious approval of faults and vices in self or others, not only burdens our inside but the other person too. And non-judgmental awareness frees us from that level of pain.

Zeroes down negative thoughts or desires for everyone– We don’t normally do or desire to harm other human beings but find difficult to control our judgment when others harm us or near and dear ones. This creates anger, frustration and nourishes negative thinking, fear, and insecurity. We work our heart out for attaining peace of mind and security. However, once we are totally firm not to judge anyone at any cost then there is no space left for the mind to spawn any negative or fearful thoughts. This is the amazingly easy solution to many of our mind’s problems! Our positivism is discovered and sustained naturally and effortlessly. This is real discovery and priceless gift from pioneers for those searching for super-easy solutions of mind’s peace and stillness. Controlling ourselves and channeling to do good out of need or social pressure is not lasting and involves some kind of effort. And I think that is why great masters declare with unbending authority that a person who doesn’t consider anyone bad in this world is the biggest contributor to world’s goodness. He never feels the need to control as he does not see others as threats.

Encourages introspection and vulnerability based management– When we hide our faults and try to justify them and on the other hand judge others for their weaknesses, they also develop the same tendency to hide theirs and judge in return. Instead, if we gradually adopt into being vulnerable, open and introspective then others do get encouragement to talk about their weaknesses, problems openly and we can brainstorm together to seek solutions. Collaborative learning, we know, is the most effective and playful way to learn. The fear of being judged is dropped and we are open and non-defensive – which gives better space for self and others to express and heal.

Most appropriate use

For self and others, we can use power to judge in such a way that it adds to our spiritual and mental wellness, let’s see how.

For Self

As we know our thoughts, emotions, actions, and drivers behind all actions and desires so it’s possible for us to do justice with ourselves whenever required. Particularly when we have committed some mistake or find us later at fault. Constructive use of judgment for self primarily involves 3 steps:

Knowing the mistake– Know your situation, and trace the fault or driver behind the wrong action. Accept it that it’s done by mistake or maybe some momentum of anger or greed, but we are clear that it is our fault and should not be repeated.

Feel the agony to overpower temptations to repeat – Sublime scriptures, masters, and the crux of our own wisdom concludes that behind all mistakes there is some greed for pleasures whether we desire that consciously or habitually. So unless we feel enough pain and agony post committing mistakes to balance out the greed for pleasures until then it is difficult to exit vicious cycle of mistake repetitions. Once the environment is favorable and time gap experienced from the last recurrence then we may again slip and succumb to temptations. Here deep agony is our powerful ally and fuel for unrestrained success, it sets the strong stage for bright future.

Do not carry guilt and repentance and preserve innocence– Know and deeply accept that we are innocent in this moment – as the mistake is done in past, we have learned from it and it no longer exists – so let go the psychological baggage of past mistakes. Firm decision not to repeat it is important but carrying further repentance could be discouraging.

Hope I am getting across. All this may sound serious but pretty important care in self-learning.

For Others

Power of belief works either way, so if we hold positive affirmations for others that can be really encouraging for them. This may be developed in many ways:

In the form of prayer for the wellness of all.

Believing everyone as innocent, good, helpful and compassionate in their essence.

If we sense some negative vibes we can reverse the direction and quality through positive beliefs and messages conveyed silently.

Trust that power of hope is much more powerful than effects of their negative actions/thoughts, one may observe temporarily.

Our trust and belief in them will encourage them to prove themselves trustworthy and encourage them to stop on repeating mistakes.

Call To Action

Decide firmly to stop judgment misuse in all percentages and let’s not give up for interim failures. Pioneers on this path assure us of the discovery of pure and peaceful layers of mind, sustained naturally and effortlessly.

Stop trusting blindly what media OR our senses show us and let’s be alert and use brains during information intake from any source.

Free up UN-Examined beliefs and ideals – our relationship with fellow beings is much more important than holding on to rigid mental structures which may just be relative and personal.

While our good actions may serve limited group but through non-judgmental awareness, we contribute to the whole world.

We can advise others but gently and softly and only when needed. Our interactions with others must be rooted in compassion and forgiveness.

Use judgment creatively for eliminating our own faults and weaknesses, and reinforcing goodness, positivism, and hope in others.

Saint Kabir’s popular verse in Hindi hinting to drop the judgmental habit.

5 Replies to “Transformative power of effective and efficient judgement”

> Liked the way experiential facts, insights have been merged with teachings of our Beloved Masters.
Great Effort Prakash !!
>The judgment misuse and its negative effects sections hit on hard and would force to think : Don’t we really want to stop this insanity of polluting the inner space of self and others?
> Transformative secrets of non judgment are useful but the final breakthrough (to me) was in section: ‘Most Appropriate Use’ (of judgement). Very profound ,plausible and worth trying !!
> Other interesting observations were :
– Surprisingly we don’t believe in positive news and seem to have unconscious and blind faith in negativity of others.
– We fail to see opportunities in challenging situations which are arrangements by Nature for our evolution.
– How unexamined assumptions and obsolete beliefs are secretly operating within and damaging us.
– Being vulnerable about our weakness encourages others to confront theirs, creating common space to heal.
> Lastly i think, while we trust that the power of hope(for any change) is much more powerful than effects of negative actions /thoughts, we should not wait really for any results as we want to be, else that will sooner or later create food for judgment misuse.
Cheers !!

Huge thanks for focussed reading and highlighting the key points from your perspective. It is certainly going to benefit other readers too. Thanks again and all the best for using judgement effectively in your life – it is one of the most precious life lesson.